Four PLA officers were hurt when their vehicle careered down a slope and overturned after a collision with a coach in Lok Ma Chau yesterday.

The coach, carrying seven workers from Yuen Long to Tai Po, hit a traffic sign in the accident and a 49-year-old passenger sustained minor head injuries.

The vehicles crashed in the Sheung Shui-bound lane of San Tin Highway near Shek Wu Wai shortly before 7 am when the PLA Pajero tried to turn on to the Mai Po Lung slip road to Castle Peak Road. It is the first accident in which PLA troops have been hurt since the handover.

Superintendent Lam Chark-sang from New Territories North Traffic said the right front part of the coach was in collision with the rear left of the PLA vehicle near the entrance to the slip road.

'The PLA vehicle ran out of control, crashed down the slope between the slip road and San Tin Highway and then overturned,' he said.

'Five PLA officers on board scrambled out of the vehicle before police arrived.' The PLA officers were on duty and en route to a barracks in Shenzhen.

The PLA driver, a 24-year-old lieutenant and the Hong Kong man were sent to Pok Oi Hospital. The other two soldiers received medical treatment at the scene.

The driver and the lieutenant were later transferred to the PLA hospital in Gascoigne Road, Yau Ma Tei. Their condition was not known. The Hong Kong man was treated at Pok Oi Hospital and discharged.

Mr Lam said police were still probing the accident, thought to be the fourth PLA traffic accident in Hong Kong.